A lobby is a transitional zone in an office building, hotel or museum, usually the first space off the main entrance. So it makes sense that the subject of a new installation in the East Lobby of the Baltimore Museum of Art is about the many different kinds of transition in the natural world, from form to gender.
‘RauI de Nieves: and imagine you are here’ is the title of a multi-media installation by Mexican-American artist Raul de Nieves that opened Nov. 19 and will be on view until May 4, 2025.
The work fills the museum’s two-story East Lobby with a series of objects that are all inspired by transformation in the natural world, including “hybrid” figures that appear to be part human and part animal; a 27-pane faux stained glass window with images of cicadas and butterflies; and 999 clear resin flies containing colorful beads and strands of the artist’s hair.
de Nieves is the second artist selected to receive the Robert E. Meyerhoff and Rheda Becker Biennial Commission, established to give artists an opportunity to explore ways to transform the museum’s East Lobby into more than just a place to walk through. His installation follows the 2019-2021 transformation of the lobby by Mickalene Thomas, who turned the space into a “living room” for viewing art as part of her exhibit, “Mickalene Thomas: A Moment’s Pleasure.”
“and imagine you are here’ is one of three exhibits or installations that the BMA unveiled this month, just in time for the Thanksgiving weekend. Others include ‘Eyewinkers, Tumbleturds and Candlebugs: The Art of Elizabeth Talford Scott,’ and ‘Art/Work: Women Printmakers of the WPA.’
“Raul de Nieves’ magnificent installation for the Meyerhoff-Becker Biennial Commission has transformed the BMA’s lobby into an environment that will elicit wonder and awe from our visitors,” said Asma Naeem, the museum’s Dorothy Wagner Director, in a statement. “The East Lobby is often where our audiences begin their BMA journey, making it an essential place of connection. We are thrilled to offer our community another opportunity to experience a visionary artist in this space with work that is joyful, inviting and sure to spark conversation and engagement.”
In his installation, which consists of eight separate works, de Nieves uses readily available craft materials such as beads, tape, colored film and feathers to evoke moments of transformation.
‘No Need for Vistas We Are Seen’ (2023) is the title of the faux stained glass window, which centers an image of a Crested Caracara falcon that visited the artist in a dream, alongside molting cicadas and Monarch butterflies, which move between the United States and Mexico.
‘A Beautiful Nightmare’ (2023) is a large chandelier that features a beaded organism suspended and waiting within a cocoon, and three beaded, feathered and adorned hybrid figures.
Two more decorated figures are placed on the first floor of the lobby, inviting visitors to sit with them on colorful benches, while surrounded by the 999 fly-sculptures on the lobby’s walls.
Born in 1983 in Morelia, Mexico, de Nieves is a multimedia artist, performer and musician who is now based in Brooklyn, New York. According to the BMA, he draws on both classical Catholic and Mexican vernacular motifs as well as aspects of queer and drag culture to create immersive narrative environments. Recent solo exhibits of his work have been presented at ICA Boston; the Museum of Contemporary Art in North Miami and SCAD Museum of Art in Savannah. His work has also been shown at The Highline; MoMA PS1; the 2017 Whitney Biennial; ICA Philadelphia and other venues.
The Meyerhoff-Becker Commission was established in 2018 as a way to activate the museum’s East Lobby with publicly accessible art, while fostering the creation of new works by contemporary artists. The installation by de Nieves was curated by Leila Grothe, the museum’s Associate Curator of Contemporary Art, with support from former Meyerhoff-Becker Curatorial Fellow Cynthia Hodge-Thorne.
The lobby installation makes reference to transition in terms of gender identity as well as motion or metamorphosis, Grothe said during a preview of the installation.
“Raul has had a longstanding interest in hybrid creatures,” she said. “He also has been thinking a lot about aspects of transformation. He has this fundamental appreciation for acts of freedom that occur when someone or something gives way to the current self that aligns with their identity. That moment of revelation when something ‘becomes’ is particularly exciting for him, and really I would say that is one of the underlying aspects of every single work” in the installation.
The metamorphosis of certain living creatures in the wild, such as the transformation from a caterpillar to a butterfly, or from a tadpole to a frog, is one sort of transformation that de Nieves addresses, she said. “But he’s also thinking about the trans experience and about drag culture when he thinks about metamorphosis.”
‘Eyewinkers, Tumbleturds and Candlebugs’
On the top floor of its contemporary wing, in collaboration with the Maryland Institute College of Art and Goya Contemporary, the museum has opened “Eyewinkers, Tumbleturds and Candlebugs: The Art of Elizabeth Talford Scott,” featuring the work of the Maryland artist, who lived from 1916 to 2011. It’s the first of nine locations in Maryland where Scott’s work will be exhibited between this month and May of 2024.
Twenty-five years ago, students with MICA’s Exhibition Development Seminar organized a retrospective of the artist’s mixed-media fiber works, a show that brought her widespread recognition. In the current exhibit, the BMA and MICA partnered with the Estate of Elizabeth Talford Scott at Goya Contemporary to build on that legacy with an exhibit that contains 19 works by the artist, including four that are in the BMA’s collection.
The BMA exhibit, which runs until April 28, 2024, was guest-curated by George Ciscle, MICA’s Curator-in-Residence Emeritus, and organized by BMA Associates Curator of Contemporary Art Cecilia Wichmann, working with a new generation of students from MICA’s Exhibition Development Seminar.
Guided by instructor Deyanne Moses, the MICA students are organizing “No Stone Left Unturned: The Elizabeth Talford Scott Initiative,” a roving exhibit that will present Scott’s work at eight other institutions around Baltimore, including museums and colleges.
Stops will include: the Cryor Art Gallery at Coppin State University; the George Peabody Library at the Peabody Institute; the Maryland Center for History and Culture; the Decker Gallery at MICA; the James E. Lewis Museum of Art at Morgan State University; The Peale; the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of African American History and Culture, and the Walters Art Museum. A kickoff event for the Initiative will be held at the BMA on Feb. 4.
“Elizabeth Talford Scott’s textiles are more than quilts; they are prayer pillows, healing shawls and family diaries – artistic creations that incorporate her personal symbolism with motifs of Africa and the Deep South,” Ciscle said in a statement. “I am delighted that the BMA and MICA are working collectively to give Talford Scott’s life story and works the time and attention they warrant and command, as well as expanding what inclusion in the arts might look like as a sustained commitment.”
Women Printmakers
‘Art/Work: Women Printmakers of the WPA’ features 50 works drawn from the museum’s holdings of works made by artists for the country’s Works Progress Administration in the 1930s and 1940s.
In 1935, the WPA’s Federal Art Project began offering employment to citizens affected by the Great Depression, including artists around the country. ‘Art/Work’ explores the contributions of women printmakers, whose work often touched on subjects such as industrial and domenstic labor and the inequities between races, genders and classes. The exhibit also links the economic, social and environmental crises of the Depression era with present day crises, underscoring the relevance of work from the WPA to contemporary issues.
‘Art/Work’ was curated by Virginia Anderson, the museum’s Curator of American Art and Department Head of American Painting & Sculpture and Decorative Arts, and Robin Owen Joyce, the museum’s Getty Paper Project Fellow. It will be on view until June 30, 2024.
Located at 10 Art Museum Drive, the museum is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday, with extended hours to 9 p.m. on Thursdays. It will be closed on Thanksgiving. Admission is free.
